Posts Tagged ‘Ringil’

We won the Second War! Okay, maybe not a total and complete victory — Manwë and his filthy Valar slaves still live. But their forces are completely routed, and we have destroyed everything they accomplished! It’s party time!

The Valar finally figured out we had returned to Arda when the Corrupting Miasma killed off all their precious plants and animals. While they were still standing around with their dicks in their hands, we attacked.

For the second time, the Hosts of Fire and Ice and Darkness and Death came screaming out of the North, riding on waves of flame and pestilence. Black-clad Melkor led the way, with faithful Wolf-Sauron at his side. Draugluin and Carcharoth kept the Hosts in line, acting as my lieutenants.

We came down upon Almaren like an avalanche, interrupting some festival or wedding or something. The Valar had set out guards, but they assumed we were newly returned to Arda, and did not think we had been preparing all this time. They were taken almost completely unprepared.

We overthrew Almaren, and Melkor overturned the island with his hands. Many faithless and cowardly Maiar were destroyed and their souls reduced to wandering shades. That’s what they get for following the Dickless Prick.

I led the Hosts as we drove the Valar and Maiar south. They were never able to get their act together, and we kept them on the defensive. Meanwhile, Melkor snuck off — he had an important job to finish, one that would give us a decisive advantage.

After many hours of battle, whatever an “hour” is, I faced off against my old boss Aulë. When I was spying on Almaren, I discovered this idiot has been taking credit for “creating Arda.” Are you fucking kidding me? After Melkor and I put in 90% of the actual work?

So I cornered him, and mocked him. “Who art thou, craven Aulë, Lord of Mud, to claim as yours what is rightfully Melkor’s?” Wow, he sure didn’t like that “Lord of Mud” bit. He tried to smash me with his axe, but I am way too quick. I bit at him and rent his flesh, and he screamed like a girl.

Suddenly, the shadows moved. That never happened, since the Two Lamps were immobile — but I knew what to expect. Most of the Maiar and Valar battling on the plain did not notice, but Aulë and I watched as Illuin slowly fell from the sky, the great pillar Helcar twisting and collapsing beneath it.

Aulë was clearly horrified — perhaps he had a better idea of the coming cataclysm. As I said, they broke the friggin’ Laws of Physics to build the pillars Helcar and Ringil. Sure, magic always defies Physical Law, but even magic has strict rules, and the Valar broke those rules to create two towers 10,000 miles in height, each supporting a miniature sun.

When Helcar and Illuin struck the disc of Arda, well, it would have been the most beautifully spectacular piece of wanton destruction I could have imagined, if I had been witnessing it from the safety of the Outer Dark. Unfortunately, I was standing on the disc at the time.

The pieces of the pillar struck the Earth and the whole disc sounded as a drum; a wave of pulverizing force, a crest of destruction ten miles high and 100 deep, spread across the face of the world at twice the speed of sound. Then Illuin hit, and he exploded as he hit like a great egg of pure flame. I don’t know where the Valar got that light, because it wasn’t from the fire spirits — it was silver and cold and deadly, and washed out over the world like water.

But Melkor, in his wrath, was not finished. While we, Hosts and Valar and Maiar alike, fled the destruction in the North, he flew South, and assailed the pillar Ringil, which held aloft Ormal, the golden lamp. She fell, and with a second wave of decimation she let loose a tide of red fire across the South of the world.

Of course we wanted to destroy the accursed lamps, just because the Valar had crafted them. But also, we knew perpetual darkness would give us back our tactical advantage.

Now, sometime around the destruction of Ormal, Tulkas woke up. That little pig Curunír failed in the one damn thing I told him to do. Tulkas rose up above the fury of the twin holocausts that were practically unmaking the world, and called out a challenge to Melkor.

Too bad for Tulkas. As you might guess, the destruction was too much for any of us to endure, and far worse than we expected. Again, let me stress — the world is not designed to support giant, physically-impossible pillars. Leave world-building to the experts, folks — that is to say, me and Melkor. Anyway, I rallied all the surviving Hosts, and we retreated back to Utumno.

Let me say this — I designed Utumno, even the doors, which were my idea. Not only did our fortress survive the twin cataclysms, but the accursed Valar could not penetrate the walls to assail us. We sat inside, comfy cozy, congratulating ourselves and drinking ale, while the Valar and Maiar outside beat on the walls and fell victim to fiery death from the flames of Illuin.

Niiiiiice.

Seriously, this could not have gone better. We lost, I dunno, a few hundred of the lesser spirits, no one important. But I’d say we wiped out a good third of the enemy Maiar. We didn’t get any Valar, which is too bad. Next time.

Ow! Crap! I can barely see to type! I hate the freaking Valar SO MUCH!

We’re still in the Outer Dark — that’s on the FAR SIDE of the sky, in case you didn’t know — and I’m freezing my ass off. I’m still in the form of a great werewolf, and let me tell you, fur only does so much good. The fiery balrogs are just fine, of course, but the rest of us are gonna die of hypothermia soon.

After our “strategic redeployment” into the Void, Melkor declared that we would wait out here until the time was ripe to strike again. This caused quite a bit of grumbling amongst the troops, and I had to kick some asses. No one questions Melkor! Although personally, I think he’s just hoping Tulkas will decide to go back home to the Timeless Halls.

Melkor just isn’t the same since the First War. He doesn’t laugh, or make jokes (he used to make wicked jokes), and he’ll hardly talk to anyone except me. His wounds are healing, but he’ll never be quite as fair again. He spends all his time brooding, planning how to kill Manwë the Dickless Prick and Tulkas.

Anyway, we’ve been keeping a close eye on the Valar traitors from out here. As I said before, we can see into The World, but they can’t see out — the sky is like one-way glass. (I know what “glass” is — it’s melted sand. I know everything there is to know about melted and burned things.)

The Valar didn’t really repair any of the damage they did to Arda during the First War — I don’t know if they’re lazy, or they just don’t care, or they like the coastlines and mountain ranges to be all jaggedy and irregular — who knows?

Yavanna (she’s the girlfriend of Aulë, my idiot former boss) went around doing her seed-planting thing, and now The World is once again buried under moldy green growth. Almost all the volcanoes have been plugged up, and there’s no magma anywhere. Ulmo has the seas all calmed down and placid, although I notice that Ossë likes to batter the coasts with some really cool storms. How the hell did Ossë not end up on our team? (Note to self — see if Ossë can be lured over.)

Then the Valar started working on some mysterious project. I couldn’t figure out what they were doing from so far away, and I begged Melkor for permission to go back into Arda and spy on the Valar — but he wouldn’t hear of it.

They built these two enormous towers, one in the far north and one in the south. (Let me explain about north, south, east and west. These are arbitrary directions devised by Melkor. He decided to call the direction from which we entered into the world “west,” and then the others follow from that.) Anyway, these towers totally and completely violate the laws of physics, the laws that I worked so hard on! Any structure that tall should be crushed under its own weight, and collapse the crust beneath it.

But ohhhhh no, when Manwë and his cronies want something, they just cheat.

So they erect these towers, and Varda comes along to place something at the top of the northern one. Of course, I’m looking right at it because I want to know what’s going on. And then…

VOOM! I’m blind!

She filled the top of the tower with pure, unadulterated LIGHT! Not just photons, but the archetypal essence of light. And it’s bright — bright enough to fill half of Arda with blinding illumination!

I’m still rubbing my eyes with my paws, trying to clear away the little squigglies from my vision. Then — yes, you guessed it — she fires up the southern tower. Now the whole world is bathed in light! And of course, it all bounces off the surface of the Disc and out into the Void!

Everyone is shielding their eyes and complaining, while Melkor just stares down in steely anger. Don’t get me wrong, we had a plan to light the world — that’s what the magma was for! Our world was going to have light for the creatures who needed it, dark for the creatures who needed that (like wolves, ahem), and lots of phosphorous raining from the sky for the plants.

The idiotic Valar now have everything bathed in unchanging light. What the hell are nocturnal animals supposed to do? Don’t these people think?

Let me tell you, the first thing that comes down when we take over again is those blasted towers. Stupid, just stupid.